The CX Blog

I recently flew to Albuquerque on business, taking my usual Southwest direct flight.  It’s the only way to go–the other options are just too long, and besides, I heart Southwest.

Well, we’re sort of having a spat, but for the most part, SW is my main plane. What’s the spat about, you might ask?  Good question…especially if you are a business traveler, and double especially if you have to submit receipts for travel.

Because if you select the Early Bird option on your ticket, it won’t show up on your receipt.  Or anywhere else that I could find.  So you will have a $20 charge you can’t account for…it won’t break the bank, but still…it’s not right.

So I emailed Southwest to see if I could get a more…ahem, complete receipt, and here’s what I got:

Thank you for your e-mail. We’re so pleased that you have taken advantage of adding our EarlyBird Check-In option to your reservation. Although we are unable to send a receipt, the EarlyBird Check-In purchase confirmation page serves as your receipt (you won’t find this information on your air travel itinerary). In the future, we recommend that you print this page for your records. If you have any additional questions about this amenity, we encourage you to check out the FAQs. We look forward to welcoming you onboard very soon.

Sincerely,

Jean, Southwest Airlines

Got that? Because nowhere in the process does the system indicate you should be printing pages as you are processing your reservation online.  And, maybe it’s just me, but I’m not accustomed to doing that…I sort of expect that the final receipt will…well, I don’t know, include all the charges.

So Biz Travelers: just a word of advice.  If you select that Early Bird check in option, remember to print the confirmation page as you are processing your reservation (I’m not entirely sure which page that is, I’m just repeating Jean’s advice above), cuz the charges will not show up anywhere else.

And yes, the billing department did call me out on this discrepancy.  And yes, I will eat the charges.

Ironically, the Early Bird feature seems to be a little too early for prime-time.

Post-script, 6/15/2010:

Amazon has always tried hard to be a company that listens.  Sometimes better than others, but the focus has traditionally been on what the customer is saying. This customer was steaming mad yesterday, for all the reasons below, and a few more.

But I think we’ve negotiated a path through the problem that suits us both, and for that, I remain an exceptionally loyal customer.  I said my part, you heard me and responded = I exist.  And bottom line, that visibility into me is what’s missing with most companies.  Companies that figure out how to do that listen/see piece well will have lifelong customers.

Thank you Amazon, for making this right.

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Just the facts….

I bought the Kindle 2 at the end of February, 2009–hot off the press for a $440.  I’ve loved it.  I’ve championed it to my friends.  I’ve been steadfast even as the iPad sang its siren song.

Until now.  After just over a year, the thing is broken.  Funny lines across the screen, chunks just missing.  I’ve rebooted, I’ve done everything I can.  No dice. No go. No fun.

I wrote to Amazon this morning and they indicated to me that for a mere $135 I could get the Kindle replaced.  I’m assuming that’s for a refurbished one that has likely experienced the same problem I am experiencing now. That brings the total to $575 for an item that is just a tad over a year old.

Jeff, are you reading this? Totally doubtful, god knows you’ve got other things to do…but just in case, come on.  The thing is buggy and  at new total of $575, I would do well to simply jump ship and get an iPad from a company I trust to make things that actually work for longer than a year.  Better yet, the library is sounding better all the time.

My demographic?  I still have, use and love my first gen iPhone.  Still works great.  Owes me not one cent.

And oh by the way, this is environmentally conscious?  Really?  Because I’m pretty sure junking this thing means another hunk of plastic in the nearest landfill.

And last but not least, could you please cancel my recent book orders?  I won’t be needing them.

I’ve been a loyal Netflix user since about the beginning, though I did drop off a one point during which time I realized the virtues of having a queue history.  I have not strayed since.

Recently we’ve become addicted in a hard-core mainlining kind of way to The Tudors.  We hate ourselves.  And yet we watch again.  And again.

The Tudors while Anne Bolyne is still alive. Less history and more...well, other things. Costumes, for example.

So, in an attempt to break free of the monkey on our backs, when we finished season 2, we didn’t move season 3 up in the queue.  That’s when our troubles began.  Because we soon realized that even though we hated ourselves, we wanted more Tudors.  So, after a couple days, we moved the series up.

But by this weekend we couldn’t even wait two days more, so on Sunday we went to a nearby dvd rental place and got the first disc in season 3–yay, we could relax and relinquish our lives for a little while.

I got up Monday morning, deleted  Disc 1 from our queue…and was disappointed to get an email later in the day that Disc 1 was on its way.  I called Netflix–they’re so flippin’ nice!–and said, well, I could understand that I didn’t delete in time, but the website said I DID delete in time, and that’s just bad form, yo.

Jennifer pretty much agreed that it would be confusing and agreed to send the next disc out to me asap, and just return Disc 1 when it came along.  Deliriously Happy!

Except….except today I get an email that the next disc is shipping and it’s NOT Disc 2.  That’s totally weird, and while I’m sure I’m somehow at fault, I called Netflix again and said, really–what’s up?  Are you guys trying to kill us?

After a long discussion in which I made it clear I really just wanted to understand why Disc 2 didn’t ship, that I was sure I somehow messed it up, Becky said she didn’t know why it didn’t ship.  It was a mystery.  Un secreto de la Iglesia, as we used to say in the 1500’s.  At the end of the call, Becky says, look I’m going to send the 2nd Disc out because I understand the addiction and because you’re such a good customer.

I was thrilled, tickled and overwhelmed by that precious feeling of intense loyalty.  Netflix, my Netflix, we are wed for life (not like Henry).

Here’s how it went:

1. Read in the news about Clearwire going to Clear on its new 4G network, clicked through to see how it might impact me, a current customer; learned that I have to upgrade to the new modem/network and that it wouldn’t cost me more to have faster speeds–great, I thought, sort of nervously….
2. Clicked the Upgrade button on the Clearwire site, clicked a few more buttons, zippity doo dah, done! They’ll send me a new modem in a matter of days.  Me: still feeling slightly nervous, imagining the mess of having to network a new IP or who knows what….
3. Received email status and info: what to expect and when to expect it, return of old modem with instructions and prepaid label, shipping status of new modem.  My interest/curiosity is piqued, still a wee bit nervous….
4. This morning the box is delivered.  From the time I open the box to the time I’m truly zipping along on the world wide web and have returned the old modem to the shipping box: 27 minutes.

(The only muss or fuss was when I didn’t follow instructions! Instead of an ethernet to my mac, I just plugged the existing ethernet from my airport wifi to the Clear modem.  Fail. The first step allows your new 4G connection to interface with Clear directly, thus establishing a link Doh. Once I figured that out, things went fast.)

Clear deserves a big hand for thinking this change through, hooking up all the little pieces that can make the headache of big change fall to the customer rather than the company initiating it.  Good job, very well done–and when I click to post this, the publishing process will go faster than I’m accustomed to…gotta love that.

Most of the companies I work with regarding customer experience strategies are big–big, global-big, huge complex problems with complex solutions. During the course of that, it would be easy to lose sight of the simple things that make the customer experience work.

That’s why a recent experience really stayed in my mind: Wavehounds, a local Seattle surfshop. Wavehounds is run by veteran surfer Todd whose approach to his biz exemplifies everything you really want in a customer experience:

1. Focus on the customer in the moment: I’m not a kid. I’m not a guy. I’m the improbable customer: an older woman who has fallen in love with surfing. Love aside, it takes a lot to go into a surf shop where I might be treated badly, as a novice, as a know-nothing. But Todd was fantastic–he welcomed me and made me feel absolutely at ease in an environment where expert and novice are often…ahem..at odds. (Most surf shops could take a page out of Harley Davidson’s reinvention of itself–HD being part of another arena that tends to dismiss newbies, their future customer base). In the corporate setting, this would be the equivalent to welcoming the customer over the phone or email, making that all important connection by introducing yourself, asking their name, maybe how they’re doing–you give them the sense you’re paying attention, that you’re welcome.
2. Listen and learn: Todd asked about my experience, where I’ve surfed, what boards I’d tried, where I was in the learning curve and what my budget was. But here’s the kicker: he listened to my answers. And that was key when he finally suggested a board for me–I had confidence that this would be the right board for my spot in the learning curve. I asked some questions, asked about other boards, learned a bunch from him, but that initial five minutes or so were the deal makers for me. It gave me the confidence I needed to commit to a board.
3. Guide but don’t push: that’s the listening-to-my-questions part. If Todd had pushed too hard, I wouldn’t have felt like I made a long term connection to a resource I would continue to use and buy from, I would have felt like a piece of meat. I want to be surfing for a while, and even though I was looking for a board, I was really looking for something much more. Todd offered that. Todd is smart.
4. Do something a little extra: Listen, it’s just not that hard, and it doesn’t have to be huge–it just has to be meaningful to the exchange. For agents on the phone, it could be something as simple as recognizing the weather where the customer is–I saw an outstanding sales agent once who closed more transactions simply because he had a google map and weather forecast open on his desktop. In the case of Wavehounds, Todd taught me how to apply wax–both undercoat and over–correctly. It’s not a big thing, I could have learned it from YouTube, but he had time and he made use of it in a way that meant a lot to me, his long term customer.
5. Be proactive: in the big company arena, this would mean knowing what was going to happen to the customer (order shipment process, repair process, etc) and setting expectations, or letting the customer know what to do next. It’s hugely important. In this instance, it meant Todd asking me where I was going to take the board out for the first time. When I mentioned the coast, he just said, “No, you’re not. Not this weekend you’re not.” And he was right–we were going to be experiencing phenomenally high surf, 30 foot waves, and it was not safe for surfing. Instead he clued me into some lesser known spots I’d never tried and didn’t even know about. I loved him for that!

See you out there, bud!

Charlene Li reviews Starbucks’ social media strategy in a new report you can access here.

She makes a number of great points, but what is crucially important in making any social media strategy work is the people and cultural awareness in an organization. Here are some highlights:

• Deputizing people throughout the organization
• Understanding how each social media channel provides a different dimension of engagement
• Centralizing coordination
• Finding champions who can explain and mitigate risk

You can download the whole report at the link above. Happy, helpful reading!

The ASP report on Ten Best Web Support sites of 2009 is due to ship in August; you can order yours now–HERE. The report will give in depth information on what the judges found that worked, didn’t work, and what the companies might do in the future for even better returns. The 2009 winners are:

OPEN DIVISION

This report will be a powerful collection of good information and real stories of how these companies “did it.” The best thing about this report is it will help you avoid costly mistakes and make use of lessons learned:

Moreover, these sites truly define “best practices” in Web support. They’ve been chosen by a rigorous review process that looks at 25 different performance metrics, including usability, design, knowledgebase implementation, interactive features, use of technology, customer experience, overall strategy, and much more.

My e-colleague nkilkenny at Design for Learning has a very nice post (Using Wikis to Teach Writing) worth taking a few minutes to read. Her understanding of how to get newbies into a wiki and using it is fabulous and helpful. Basicially she lays out an exercise where they are allowed to access, edit, collective view, and collaborate on a written piece together–simple, elegant, effective.

This approach can be used for any group, any age–9th grade to the exec level at a corp. In order for execs to buy into the idea of using wikis–which for many have a slightly scary, techie reputation and the name, wiki, what’s up with that? –they need to access the concept of a wiki first and Natalie’s approach is so simple to set up and get working, anyone can access it.

Very helpful, thanks! Anyone else have approaches to teaching a concept such as use of a wiki?

One clear aspect of Amazon’s success is its holistic understanding of the customer experience.  What goes on “behind the curtain” shouldn’t be seen or felt by the customer, because all the customer is really interested in is the experience of the store or service.

Jeff Bezos said at the investor’s meeting recently:

“If you identify the key drivers of customer experience - those key needs - they are unlikely to change over a 10-year period. So if you base strategy on things that are permanent in time, very durable things, all the energy you put into those things continues to pay you dividends years into the future.” He identified those key drivers as low prices; vast selection; and extreme convenience - especially fast, reliable delivery.”

Those things sound pretty straight-forward, pretty much the farthest thing from Rocket Science, yet they’re very difficult to do.  Just think of the million moving parts from the website product listing, to the online ordering process, to the internal order processing, to the communications, the picking/packing/shipping, the online order status….on and on.  Getting that box to your door when it is supposed to be there ends up seeming like magic, once you take all those things into consideration.

But the Amazon focus on customer experience doesn’t want it to seem as much like magic as like steady-as-she-goes normal, repeatable, expected, predictable, brandable.  And that’s brilliant.